Friday, July 24, 2009

Shopping, kapsalon, wine and weed

Word of the day: honger/hongerig = hungry

Missed the full English, so made myself one, without salty bacon and sausage.

I came to the Netherlands with only 4 pairs of shoes. Shock, horror, gasp! To those who know me. Yes, I was being very responsible: flip flops, sandals, white ballet flats and Nikes. I figure that the black ballet flats I have have all been purchased from Europe, so I'd do well to look for a pair here.

After a few days just wearing my Nikes to walk around, I was feeling severely fashion-deprived. My white ballet flats are too thin to walk around for long, plus I can't wear my black tights with white shoes (shock, horror, gasp!). So we finally scheduled in a Shoe Shopping Day on Hoogstraat.

Bought a pair of black flats from H&M, which aren't extremely comfortable for long walks, but were really cheap at €15. Then walked a few shops down to Clarks and bought a pair of proper girly flats for walking. Very comfy! Although they are technically dark brown, I'm sure I'll survive. I'd better, anyway, since I broke the budget with that one.

This is for frachely who asked if this place is clean.

On our way home. Setting up for the upcoming Zomer Carnaval (Summer Carnival) this weekend.

Pancake restaurant! Strange thing about the Dutch language is that it keeps changing. It used to be Pannekoek, now it's Pannenkoek. It must cost a lot to change signboards like the one above.

I found a recipe for Sweet n Sour shrimp, but as Schrobbenmaster doesn't like seafood, I substituted it for pork, altered some ingredients and measuring amounts *ahem*, and while it didn't taste like sweet n sour in the end, it did taste yummy. So for once, we didn't have to suffer through one of my cooked dinners.

Fragrant!

Yummy!

All this was the day before yesterday, by the way. Yesterday, didn't do much except spray a third layer of blackboard paint on the kitchen cupboard door, then remove the masking tape and newspaper. It actually looks alright. Just gotta do up the other door, then pictures will be up here.

Had a pretty late dinner for Dutch standards - around 9pm - and was really hungry. We were planning to have pannenkoek, but Schrobbenmaster was tired from messing about (yes, still!) with his server, so we walked out to get kapsalon instead.

It's a Turkish-Dutch dish with lettuce on top, lamb strips in the middle and lots of chips at the bottom. It's really yummy. It was born in Rotterdam, in a shop that used to be a kapsalon (hair salon), hence the name. And now everyone's hooked onto it and it's spreading around the country. Mmmmm...

Okay, it's time to do some proper work. Oh, and by the way, Shinjuku Incident is just such an awful film.